[hrothgar]

Walddk, on Sep 29 2005, 08:24 PM, said:

Point taken Arend, but how much longer will the commentators we have now donate all their time for free? I can't answer that question myself, but I can tell you and others that several have already aired the view that it's about time that they get a little something for all the hard work.

Personally, I would be more than happy to contribute money to hear commentary from qualified individuals. I'd pay even MORE to be able to shut up some current commentators...

I'm an economist at heart. I believe that markets are one of the best way to organize scare resources. (I'm also a leftist, so I also have a healthy appreciation of the limitation of markets).

In all honesty, I think that commercializing these services will dramatically increase quality. However, whatever commercial model gets adopted needs to reflect the fact that these Vugraphs feature very high fixed costs and negible variable costs.

[cherdano]

hrothgar, on Sep 29 2005, 07:34 PM, said:

In all honesty, I think that commercializing these services will dramatically increase quality.

If you compare the quality of the commercially driven vuegraph services with the community driven one on BBO, I think it is pretty clear which one was more successful and provided better quality. (Yes I know, the quality in terms of reliability of the connection, competence of the operator on BBO varies quite a bit depending on the local organization, but still I would never swap for this other vuegraph broadcast.) So at least I have doubts on your view.

Arend

[hrothgar]

cherdano, on Sep 29 2005, 09:06 PM, said:

If you compare the quality of the commercially driven vuegraph services with the community driven one on BBO, I think it is pretty clear which one was more successful and provided better quality. So at least have doubt on your view.

I'm not sure whether this is necessarily an apt comparison...

Historically, the online bridge market was very fragmented. There were a variety of commercial sites including OKBridge, Swan, ACBL Online (anyone remember Telebridge!). There were also a number of free sites. BBO is obviously the most obvious example of a Free site, but theres also Floater. OKB was originally a free site, though it migrated into the commercial camp. The point is, there are a LOT of different services out there.

Equally significant: The way things currently work, tournament organizers can only partner with a limited number of Vugraph providers. "Live" Vugraph works by having kibitzers sitting at the tables, desperately trying to copy biddng and play into a laptap. if you're lucky, said kibbitzers have a stool and can actually see most of what's going on. Regardless, its important to recognize that you really can't support more than one Vugraph at a time. [The obvious exception is if you are piggybacking off the "live" Vugraph at the event site where you don't have this artifical limitation]

More recently, the market seems to be contracting, with BBO establishing a dominant position in the market. I think that the event organizers are making an "obvious" decision to partner with the site with the largest audience. Initially this was OKB. More recently its BBO.

I do agree that the quality of Vugraph has steadily improved over time. I recall working with Matt and Wirt to provide Vugraph long long ago in Reno (Henry Sun and I almost never made it through the Donner Pass). However, with all due respect to Roland and the stellar job that he is doing, I think that this may be an example of learning by doing... A lot of a quality improvement is a function of additional experience with the medium rather than the bill model bring used.

[Walddk]

Maybe we were too naive in our attempt to strive for perfection (read "high quality"). Maybe one won't realise what quality is until it drops dramatically, if it does. I don't want it to drop; I want it to get even better, but it's a fact that you can't do it with no money.

If I understand Uday correctly, he wouldn't mind much if we lost some of the commentators if they decide to charge for their service. There will always be others to take over. I am sure there will, but does that also mean that you keep the quality? Does that not concern you, Uday?

I for one think that you should worry about it. There is no substitute for class, and you usually don't get class for nothing. You get what you pay for, and that is perfectly acceptable in all aspects of life.

Why would that be any different with vugraph presentations?

Roland

[hrothgar]

Walddk, on Sep 29 2005, 09:35 PM, said:

If I understand Uday correctly, he wouldn't mind much if we lost some of the commentators if they decide to charge for their service. There will always be others to take over. I am sure there will, but does that also mean that you keep the quality? Does that not concern you, Uday?

I for one think that you should worry about it. There is no substitute for class, and you usually don't get class for nothing. You get what you pay for, and that is perfectly acceptable in all aspects of life.

With all due respect, I'm not going to worry about it.

Don't get me wrong. I REALLY like live Vugraph. But if Kokish or whomever decide that they require a slice of the pie in order to contribute to Vugraph, I'm not gonna lose much sleep.

If enough people value the service, commentator XYZ will get paid somehow.
If people don't value the service, the commentators won't.

In all honesty, my biggest worry is that the ACBL or the WBF will mess things up by demands large fees for the "right" to broadcast the event. I see an explict linkage between fee structures and commentary as a mechanism to prevent this eventuality.

[fred]

Walddk, on Sep 29 2005, 06:35 PM, said:

If I understand Uday correctly, he wouldn't mind much if we lost some of the commentators if they decide to charge for their service. There will always be others to take over. I am sure there will, but does that also mean that you keep the quality? Does that not concern you, Uday?

I agree with Uday - this does not concern me either.

Those that we lose are in this for the wrong reasons. I don't have anywhere near as much contact with the commentators that Roland does, but my impression is that the vast majority of them are in this for the right reasons.

Those commentators that I am in frequent contact with tend to be friends who hang out in the same bridge circles as me. These circles contain most of the world's elite players and, not coincidentally, these people also tend to be the best and most popular commentators.

We are not going to lose people like Larry Cohen, Michael Rosenberg, and Sabine Auken. They commentate because they (correctly!) think their involvement is good for bridge. Besides that, if it was money they were after, they are smart enough to understand that value of the good PR that results from their involvement (in terms of its potential impact on their careers as professional bridge players) far outweighs any reasonable salary they might receive for doing online vugraph commentary.

It is true that some of the top professional players are mercenaries, but most are not.

Of course the best commentators are primarily interested in the best tournaments. For the vast majority of tournaments we cover, most of the commentators are not superstars. Of course they are fine players and of course some of the best commentators are not the best players.

I don't have as much contact with these people, but I find it hard to believe that large numbers of them are in this for the money. Furthermore, I suspect there are a lot of good players out there who have never commentated before and would be willing to give it a try if they knew that we needed new people. No doubt some of these people have the potential to be excellent commentators.

This is not meant to take anything away from the skills of the fine people who provide commentary on our site, but BBO probably has 1000s of members whose bridge and communications skills are strong enough for them to be potentially effective as commentators.

Uday himself is one of these people. Maybe that's why he isn't worried. I'm not worried either.

Fred Gitelman
Bridge Base Inc.
www.bridgebase.com

[Al_U_Card]

card_judge, on Sep 29 2005, 10:08 AM, said:

What a novel idea moving from pasteboard to computers!!

That would also solve Luis' problem of pulling a stack or single bidding cards, no revokes, no playing out of turn. What will they think of next?

And you have the addition of a timer that makes your call in tempo and if you go over the limit it counts the additional time between pop-up and click (ignoring latency issues). That way no one could argue that they took a typical amount of time when they were only over the time on that particular bid and by 17 seconds....

[reisig]

I can only speak for myself...I do vugraphs (commentary) because I love the idea of allowing 1,000's of players of all levels see some of the finest players in action. It only helps the game in the long run. The idea of charging never entered my mind...I know..you're saying - we wouldn't miss you, anyway! I believe that 90+% of the commentators do it for the same reasons that I do ..to help promote OUR game. I applaud the concept or free access to these shows.

[Al_U_Card]

Anyone recall the bridge TV program from the 60's with Charles Goren and Alex Drier? (Play Bridge! I think....) They pretty much trivialized the game to try and render it a "show". Banal repartee between the commentators and "inside info" on the players.

I have only occasionally watched a vugraph but think that just seeing the play is, of itself, sufficient. Selling commercials on the screen (like "You don't know Jack" etc.) would be distracting but acceptable if required to keep the presentation free for all the right reasons.

[mycroft]

I'd be willing to give money to the "give back to vugraph" fund; I strongly agree with Fred, however, that it should be free for use - and for the reason he has given frequently; it's a way of bringing more bridge players into the game and encouraging discussion and growth of bridge even at the club level (by looking at what the best do, and what the best think about what the best do).

It's frustrating that everybody thinks it's someone else's job to pay what's necessary; but BBO volunteers enough cash through programming, server hosting, and promotion, so I think it's got its side paid for.

This is why, whatever I think of the non-bridge discussion during the vugraphs, I don't say anything. The experts that choose to have fun watching good bridge and showing off for the rest of us are doing so on the "it's worth it to me" model - and a bit of non-bridge stuff to filter out is part of the price. However, I expect a fair number would have a different idea if a fee was being charged, and they didn't get any of it.

Michael.

[Booze]

hi

it was not my intention to start a topic if Vugraphs should be free or not , Fred has once decided that they should be , enough said in this.

I didn`t intend to discuss commentators either, they are fine and doing well.

If BBO thinks Vugraphs from Estoril will be good enough without Rolands presence there also OK.

Malmö was a low budget project that worked rather OK in many ways. I tried to keep costs low as I could, we had 6 full time operators and 6 half time + Roland as coordinator, Wojela as web updater. BBO staff was very often the first to come to the venue in the morning and last to leave at night.

During those 15 days we rather often got the question " How much do EBL pay you guys for this?" Sadly I had to answer not a cent.

Everyone thought it was scandal. The boys and girls distrubuting hands or papers earned 10 Big Mac and company per day, while BBO folks got none.

I stayed at a hostel in a 4 bed room, Roland stayed at a relatives home and Wojela and the other Poles slept at the floor in a friends house. We brought food to the venue , it was rather expensive eating there.

None of us complained, we worked hard and did as I saw it a huge success. I estimated we had over 50 000 specs during the 2 weeks. I am very glad that BBO, the people who worked in Malmö and over 100 commentators could give you all this for free.

As you all understand this is something that can`t happen several times a year, BBO cant afford it, the volunteers have to make a living and so on.

If we want free high quality Vugraphs we have to let volunteers work under better circumstances and absolutely not pay for it.



Thats why I started this topic, hoping we could find a solution!!

Bo

[mrdct]

Interestingly, the Australian Bridge Federation has today published a remuneration policy for "helpers" including data entry people which I presume includes BBO operators. http://www.abf.com.a...ut/helpers.html

A$80 (about US$60) is the specified per diem for data entry which for someone living in the same city should be enough to pay for petrol, parking and a couple of meals with bit of spare change to spend at the bar after play is finished.

I think it's fair enough, particularly if travel and accommodation can be neogiated with the convenor for out-of-towners.

[Booze]

Thats similar to what Italian Federation pays as I have heard for operators, and I think its great.

We had only 2 half time operators living in Malmö, Swedish federation was not interested in helping us at all , they have a contract with Swan Games.

They were extremly lucky to have BBO staff at venue , the INtranet didnt work at all before we came, I had to tell them the solution of the problem.

And think you agree it is worth a lot to have at least one expirenced operator and well informed of BBO software. Several times I have helped organisers from all of the world to converte files.

And Rolands outstanding job has also to be done, I dont know if I ever seen a more dedicated person to his task.

Bo

[FAQPG]

[QUOTE]Fred
In addtion, it is not unlikely that there will be some volunteers among BBO members from Portugal (or elsewhere) who will act as operators at least some of the time (so that we can broadcast from more than 2 tables at a time).

First of all i would like to apologies for my bad english second i think as the coordinator of the caddys for Estoril, that is going to be very difficult to find volunteers to act as operators of the viewgraph, im having a lot of trouble find young people to be caddys and the portuguese federation is paying for the job, 20 days for the beginning and i still havent got the number they ask for. I dont now if this brings something of importance to the discussion but im writing it anyway

I really think a viewgraph coordinator is needed there.

Best regards,


Francisco Pereira Gonçalves (FPG)